The Hound of the Baskervilles

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Week 1 - Summary

The Hound of the Baskervilles — Week 1 of 8 Chapters I & II. Read along with us in The Weekly Serial app

You've just met him in Chapter I, doing his party trick with Dr Mortimer's walking stick, deducing the owner's life from a few scratches in the wood. I used to think that scene was just Doyle showing off Holmes for readers who hadn't met him yet.

Reading it again this time, I'm not sure that's all it's doing. It feels more like Doyle making sure you know exactly who this man is, right before sending him somewhere very dark indeed.

"Has anything escaped me?" I asked with some self-importance. "I trust that there is nothing of consequence which I have overlooked?"

"I am afraid, my dear Watson, that most of your conclusions were erroneous. When I said that you stimulated me I meant, to be frank, that in noting…

Dave - Weekly Serial Editor

July 5, 2026

The Hound of the Baskervilles

Holmes had been dead for eight years.

Not retired. Not travelling. Dead. Killed by Professor Moriarty at the Reichenbach Falls in 1893, in a story Doyle had written specifically to get rid of him. He’d told his mother it was the only way. Holmes was taking up too much space in his head, crowding out the historical novels he actually wanted to write.

Twenty thousand people cancelled their subscriptions to The Strand Magazine in protest.

So when The Hound of the Baskervilles began serialising in 1901, it wasn’t just a new mystery. It was an event. Holmes was back.

Doyle had found a clever escape hatch: set the story before Reichenbach. Holmes wasn’t resurrected. He’d never died.

This was just... a case Watson had forgotten to mention.

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